Little Seeker
by Gryffindor Phoenix
Summary: Harry has difficulty playing Cho at Quidditch - his feelings for her are the reason why. Story takes place in the hospital wing after they both fall off their brooms. *Chap 3 Uploaded*
1. Snitches and Secrets

Harry Potter lay wide-awake, thoughts churning over and over in his restless mind, the hospital wing growing darker with every second.  
  
Why hadn't he been able to catch the snitch?? So many times it had fluttered in his direction. He knew he had had more then one opportunity where he could have easily reached forwards and grabbed it. His Firebolt was definitely the broom of choice - the snitch may be fast but he could easily outstrip it.  
  
Another thing his Firebolt could easily outstrip was Cho Chang's Comet Two Sixty. That ancient broom was nothing compared to his own, Cho should have been no competition for him, yet it was matches against her he feared the most, even more then matches against Malfoy.  
  
Harry turned his head to the side. Cho was lying in the bed next to his.   
  
Both of them had come tumbling of their brooms in the last Gryffindor VS Ravenclaw Quidditch match, and neither of them had managed to catch the snitch.   
  
As Harry looked at her lying silently next to him, the thought he had been trying to ignore for hours drifted back into his mind.  
  
"She's the reason you couldn't catch the snitch."  
  
As much as Harry tried to deny it, he knew it was true. He could have easily won that match if he had wanted to, but the picture of himself winning wasn't what he kept imagining - it was the picture of Cho loosing.  
  
Seeing a disappointed Cho flying sadly back to the ground, seeing her teammates throwing angry looks at her, wasn't what Harry wanted to see.  
  
Even worse, what if he beat her, and she resented him for it?  
  
"That's stupid," Harry told himself. "You beat her before in third year remember? And she never thought twice about it. And what about Cedric? He had versed her in the Ravenclaw/Hufflepuff matches, and she didn't let that get in the way of her relationship with him"  
  
Harry's stomach gave an uneasy lurch - "her relationship with him."   
  
Harry couldn't forget the way they walked hand in hand up the corridor with each other, the way they danced so gracefully at the Yule Ball, but that was before……  
  
Maybe that was another reason he had failed to catch the snitch. Maybe Cedric was still in the back of his mind. Maybe he felt guilty for liking Cho when Cedric's death had only just passed.  
  
Harry sat up and put on his glasses. Cho looked so beautiful lying there beside him, the moonlight from an open window dancing across her face.  
  
"Are you awake?" he said suddenly.  
  
Cho stirred and mumbled quietly under her breath. Harry thought it best to just leave her alone, but Cho was still mumbling and moving around, and before Harry could stop her, she had rolled a little too far to the right and toppled straight of her bed, onto the hospital wings cold hard floor.  
  
"Ouch!" she moaned, clutching her hand to the part of her forehead that had collided with the ground.  
  
Harry jumped out of his bed to help her.  
  
"Are you OK?" he asked, helping her back onto her bed.  
  
"What…oh…yeah……hey!" Cho suddenly realised who has helping her. "Harry! I forgot you were in here too!"  
  
Cho had a few bruises on her arm and some particularly nasty scratches on her elbow and above her left eye, souvenirs of the fall from her broom.  
  
Harry had received a cut down his left arm and a bruise around his right eye. Luckily both of them were flying quite low to the ground when they had collided into each other and neither had any serious injuries. Madam Pomfrey, however, still found reason to keep them both in the hospital wing overnight.  
  
As they both sat down, Cho reached up and brushed away the hair that was covering Harry's bruised eye. His stomach gave another one of its funny jolts as her skin brushed against his.  
  
"Sorry about that," she said.  
  
"Don't worry," said Harry "It was as much my fault, and besides, it looks like you came out of it the worst." He looked at the scratches on her arm.  
  
"They're nothing," said Cho smiling. 


	2. Saying Too Much

A few moments passed in silence before either of them spoke again, then, to Harry's dismay, Cho voiced the question that had been playing on his mind all night long. As she spoke, it became clear that she had been thinking it as well.  
"How come neither of us managed to catch the snitch?"  
Harry suddenly became aware that Cho was holding one of his hands in hers, examining a scratch that ran down his index finger. He liked the way her fingers were entwined around his.  
"I dunno," he said. "Maybe it was the weather."  
"Harry," said Cho "we had perfect weather."  
Harry remained silent. He knew perfectly well why he had been incapable of capturing the snitch (and it had nothing to do with the weather) - but did she?  
Harry looked up at Cho. Her silky black hair fell gracefully around her face. Her pale skin glowed beautifully in the moonlight. He let out a sigh. Cho looked at him.  
"Well?" she said.  
Harry turned away from her.  
"I don't know" he replied.  
Cho let go of his hand and he quickly turned back to look at her. She crossed her arms and looked him directly in the eye.  
"I think you do," she said.  
Harry tried hard not to blush, but it wasn't working.  
"We haven't been training hard enough," she said.  
"What?!"   
Harry wasn't sure whether she was joking or not. He looked blankly at her - maybe this was her way of getting him to confess.  
"We've been training hard enough!" he said exasperatedly.  
"Well obviously not, or one of us would have got that little gold...."  
Harry suddenly became annoyed. He had been training harder than ever before - and that was saying something, Harry thought, as he remembered those long gruelling sessions Wood had put him through.   
"Gryffindor have been doing nothing but training!!" he snapped suddenly. "We're out there every night on the pitch, even when it's raining we're out there. We're out there far more that any other team! And I'm a good seeker, I catch that snitch every time we have practices, and even in matches I usually get it. Just because we might lose to Ravenclaw doesn't mean anything and it's not my fault that I like you!!!"  
Harry slammed his hands over his mouth, he hadn't meant to say that.  
Cho looked at him with a mixture of surprise and satisfaction on her face - that was what she had been trying to get him to confess.  
Harry suddenly blushed scarlet and desperately tried to avoid Cho's eyes.  
"I…I...." he stammered. "I didn't mean that...I....I just....I was just thinking....thinking that.....um...."  
Cho didn't move, she just kept watching Harry who was becoming increasingly flustered. 


	3. The Decision

The pair sat in silence for quite some time after that. Harry was so embarrassed that he'd let himself slip up, "Bet that's what she was hoping for" he thought to himself.  
  
Cho lay wide-awake in the next bed. She hadn't said a thing. Harry wondered how she felt about all this and what was going through her head right now. Dare he ask her? She already knew how he felt now anyway. Or maybe, maybe he could lie his way out of it - he'd certainly had enough experience of that with Snape.  
  
Harry thought to himself, he didn't want to lie his way out of it: It was true that he liked Cho and now that she knew maybe he would stand half a chance.  
  
"Cho?" Harry said suddenly  
  
"Hmmm?"  
  
He didn't know what to say, exactly how was he supposed to interpret what he was thinking? But to his surprise (and gratitude) Cho spoke first.  
  
"Did you really mean it?" she said.  
  
"Well," he paused - it wasn't too late to get out of this, but he thought the better of it. "Yeah. Yeah I did, actually"  
  
"So all that rambling after you said it..."  
  
"…was just me trying to get out of it." Harry finished the sentence for her. He grinned. "You know, try to save myself some embarrassment."  
  
Cho looked at him and to his relief she was smiling. It was a rather awkward sort of smile though, she looked like she was having some sort of mental argument with herself - it was obvious to Harry what she was thinking.  
  
"So," said Harry, trying to brake the silence.  
  
"Yeah," said Cho.  
  
"So, um, what…um….what do you…think?"  
  
Cho looked at him; her smile faded a little. Then, to his immense surprise, she leaned in and kissed him.  
  
Harry's whole body went suddenly numb. He wasn't quite sure what to do here, this wasn't what he'd expected, but it was certainly what he'd been hoping for ages now, so he kissed her back.  
  
He was aware of the way his cheeks were burning, the way his eyes had involuntarily closed themselves and the way he had somehow managed to get his arms around Cho - he was also aware of the way Cho had managed to do the same. All he could think of now was the hope that Madam Pomfrey wouldn't walk in. 


End file.
